The online game “Incorruptible Fighter” was an instant sensation in Chinese cyberspace upon its debut on July 25th. Developed by civil servants in the city of Ningbo, in the prosperous eastern province of Zhejiang, it offered gamers a virtual world where they could hunt down, torture and execute corrupt officials, their children, and their bikini-clad mistresses. It was downloaded more than 100,000 times in its first week. The server capacity provided for the game (500 players at one time) was woefully inadequate, and on August 3rd the website announced it was taking the game offline for an upgrade. Created with the aim of making a “lighthearted counterpoint to constant accusations of endemic corruption” in officialdom, the game’s roaring popularity seems to have touched a raw nerve. A July 31 article on the website of China Radio International (CRI) called the game “shallow, vulgar, and childish.” On August 15th, the cutting-edge Southern Metropolis Daily reported that the website hosting “Incorruptible Fighter” had, in fact, been shut down “on orders from related departments.” As “Incorruptible Fighter” was giving rise to lively online debate over the propriety of this latest shot at rampant corruption, the communist party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced on August 7th that 10 prosecutors from impoverished Anhui province had been punished for forging an invitation from Finland’s ministry of justice to visit that country. The now infamous junket to Finland took place last November. Finnish immigration officials quickly determined that the document was a fake and the delegation, led by Xu Wenai, vice procurator-general of Anhui, was deported shortly after arriving at the Helsinki airport. The excursion, paid for by the Chinese government, would have taken the group to eight cities in five countries.Xu Wenai is reported to have been removed from his post, and the organizer of the tour, Ye Bin, has been stripped of party membership and faces criminal prosecution. While traveling abroad on phony invitations has become increasingly common in recent years, judging from the tone of Chinese media reports, this particular incident has proved to be especially offensive to the face-conscious Chinese. Chinese nationals living in Helsinki are reported to be mortified by the prominent coverage given to the scandal by Helsingin Sanomat, the largest daily in Finland. The “face losing” factor was compounded by the fact that Xu and his traveling companions were themselves prosecutors and were caught in–of all places–Finland, ranked by Transparency International as the world’s least corrupt country. But in China, corruption is so entrenched that in 2004 the central committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) cautioned in a policy paper that the anti-corruption drive was a “life and death struggle” for the party. In January the following year, President Hu Jintao warned that corruption was “the most dangerous factor to weaken the CPC’s ruling basis.” Perhaps even more dangerous than “Incorruptible Fighter.”
